Day: February 28, 2025

This weekend, we are throwing a party and celebrating our pastor, Pastor Sheyna, for 15 years of leading our church, Rohi Christian Church. It’s going to be a great time but it’s an especially important thing to do as the Bible tells us to give honor where honor is due, and for those elders who rule over you, they are worthy of double honor. 

Why does it matter so much though, you may ask. It matters because our pastor and any leader over you that is teaching about having a relationship with God, is living for and preaching Jesus while operating in the Holy Spirit, is committed to us knowing and living for what matters most. Our pastor has given up her life to teach others how to give their lives to God and live for Him. 

Again, why does that matter? It matters because we may have gotten saved but we may struggle with living for God. It’s not always easy to choose to live for God: “l have to work, or I have my family to tend to, so I’m not sure when I can spend time with God. I need to pay rent, got bills and I want to do some shopping, so I don’t know about tithing. I don’t feel like going to church. I do want to go hang out and party, get faded and cray cray.” Everything else seems to matter but God until something happens where we need God. 

All those other things we can tend to be more concerned about are the same things the world is concerned about. We are not supposed to look like the world. We are different, God’s special people and so we are supposed to live different where God comes first. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you (Matthew 6:33). 

It’s God who matters more than anything or anyone else in our lives. If we struggle to honor Him, live for Him, put our trust in Him, be in His Word, or know Him, we need to check how much He matters to us. It’s for this reason that we celebrate our pastor as it is not easy to lead people to God. There’s constant redirecting to God. And if there wasn’t someone doing it, where would we be right now? Thank God for those He put over us who point us back to what really matters.

I had an epiphany this week. There are some words that are so small yet so powerful. For example, the word “no”. It’s a two letter word, so simple, yet so profound. It gives direction that something is not wanted or agreed to or opposite of whatever “yes” or “okay” would be. It shuts things down. 

Another small word that is quite dynamic is “go.” Again, it’s so simple yet so powerful in which it can be a command, a directive, and a verb (action word).This little word tells us to move out of the position we are in and keep moving until there is a need to stop. The small word “to” leads us in direction from where we were or where something is until we come to the place of new. 

Another small yet big word is “do.” It’s another word that puts us into action to get something accomplished or at least activated in motion. We tend to like to tell others what to do, but struggle to do things ourselves. 

It’s just amazing that it takes so little to be said but invokes a profound response for us to move into action or stop an action. However, we use so many words to explain away why we can’t do something, or we talk about how much we know or how many plans we have but haven’t done anything as of yet still. We waste words and our breath. It’s time to say less and do more. No excuses. Just go! Stop being lazy.

“In all labor there is profit, But idle chatter leads only to poverty.”- ‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭14‬:‭23‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

If there’s anything we know about God, we know that He does things quite differently than we do. It’s been said that God operates an upside down kingdom. I’d beg to differ. I think God’s kingdom is actually the right-side up kingdom and we people are the ones who do things upside down from what He does. For example, when we hear God say to love your enemies, or to turn the other cheek, it sounds foreign, backwards and totally off to us, but it’s in fact the way God has said to love people and God is never wrong or off about anything. 

We see and deal with this in our lives when it comes to what’s known as “The Golden Rule.” The Golden Rule is Matthew 7:12 NLT and it says, “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.” We tend to have a problem with this Golden Rule when it comes to showing love to someone who hasn’t done it for us. Usually, our thinking is, “I will only treat a person right if they treat me right.” We can’t think that way as that’s backwards to what the rule is saying and totally misses the meaning of the total word of God. 

The rule never said that the other person has to have it all together before we can do right by them. In fact, we didn’t have it all together, but “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Father God and Jesus did not hold back on showing love, goodness, kindness, and mercy even though we were showing disobedience, dishonor, hate, disregard, and sin towards them. Neither should we.

For whatever situation you are facing today, however you would want to be treated is how you ought to treat the people in the situation. Yeah, they might not deserve it. Neither did we nor do we now, but God has given it anyway. Stop waiting for people to change or do you right first. Grace and mercy was not just for God to give away and it stop there. If we received grace and mercy, we should be giving grace and mercy away too. 

Today, let’s decide to come back to Jesus, to repent of pride and disobedience. Let’s agree with what God says and do it. That gift of grace and mercy you give away may be the thing that leads the other person to see Jesus and maybe decide to change and even choose to give Jesus their lives. In order for them to live their best life though, we must first start living our life like it’s “golden.” Follow the rule.